


In Moments

by orphan_account



Category: Glass Sword - Victoria Aveyard, King’s Cage - Victoria Aveyard, Red Queen - Victoria Aveyard, War Storm - Victoria Aveyard
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Heavy Angst, Hurt, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-09-29 22:16:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17211830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: A mother’s love is expressed in different ways . . . some in darker ways than one.





	In Moments

**Author's Note:**

> what’s up, wonderful people? how are you all? yes, i made it to my second fanfic! enjoy some nicely cooked up angst!

❝ʜᴇ ᴅᴏᴇsɴ’ᴛ ᴋɴᴏᴡ.

ʜᴇ ᴛʀᴜʟʏ ᴅᴏᴇsɴ’ᴛ ᴋɴᴏᴡ ᴡʜᴀᴛ ᴘᴀʀᴛs ᴏғ ʜɪs ᴍɪɴᴅ ᴀʀᴇ ʜɪs ᴏᴡɴ ᴀɴᴅ ᴡʜᴀᴛ ᴘᴀʀᴛs ᴡᴇʀᴇ ᴍᴀᴅᴇ ʙʏ ʜᴇʀ.❞

~♛~

He doesn’t understand why it hurts so much. It feels like his head is being burned alive, inside out, and it’s not caused by his own fire. There’s a grating sound in the back of his mind, like steel scraping against stone, and it makes him wince. 

There’s a voice in his head, and he knows that he’s no longer alone in his thoughts - someone’s creeping around, sifting through his memories and thoughts carelessly, like they’re nothing important. Someone’s making him walk. He doesn’t like it, but he can’t figure out how to shout for help, to cry, to do something. It’s like he’s paralyzed, trapped in his own body, and someone else holds his strings, someone else is the puppeteer, while he’s just the puppet. 

Maven sees his mother, the one he loves, or is supposed to. He tries to call for help, to reach for her, beg her to save him, to give him some sort of relief, to stop this unbearable pain that keeps burning him. But, she doesn’t move. It’s like she’s immune to his tear-streaked cheeks and pleading, pain-filled eyes. _Stop being **weak** ,_ the words are burned into his mind, repeated over and over until they sound like a song, but one full of dissonance and one that’s not right. It shouldn’t be a song. It shouldn’t sound like a melody. But it does. 

The pain is getting worse, and he can only scream inside his own mind, the echoes of his screams bouncing off inside his empty head, until they twist into something unrecognizable. As his body moves towards his mother, he cries harder, silent tears trickling down his face. His two year old mind doesn’t understand what’s going on, why this is happening to him, what he did to deserve this, but he does know one thing.

It’s his mother’s doing. 

~

He made himself walk, because he was scared. Of his mother. Or he was. He no longer feels that fear. Although he’s only five, he knows one thing better than anything. His mother is a surgeon with minds, and she’s already taken the things she doesn’t like out of his mind. He can remember that he was once afraid of the dark, of what lurked in the shadows, but his mother took that fear away too, and for once, he was grateful. It’s no fun being scared. 

Cal hasn’t realized what’s been going on, but Maven hopes every single day that he’ll find out and make his mother stop. He wants his father to get rid of his mother, to make her leave him alone. He wants to play outside or play with wooden swords and fight with Cal, but his mother doesn’t let him, doesn’t let him do normal child things. She trains him, drilling the lessons into his head until they’re all he can think about. She’s teaching him how to cooperate, to be obedient, to play the part. He doesn’t like it, but she won’t stop, no matter how many times he asks her to. She says it’s love, and what she’s doing is all for him, for him to get the crown. 

All he knows is that a crown is a shiny metal thing that you wear on your head and it’s something a king wears. While he may not like his mother for what she’s doing, he still loves her, because he has to. He still feels this urge to impress her. So one day, he makes a paper crown, taking the time to color it gold and make it look fancy, and puts it on his head, and struts around the palace, ordering servants around in a commanding voice, but there’s laughter behind his words. He likes this. He sees this as a game. 

Cal makes fun of him, calls him a sissy and a girl, and that makes him cry, and he runs to his mother, the paper crown in his hands. He comes, expecting comfort and maybe a hug, but all she does is rip the crown out of his small hands and look down on him with disdain and disappointment in her striking blue eyes. He bows his head, ashamed, large sobs threatening to erupt from him, tears pricking at the corners of his eyes like thorns. 

His mother teaches him another important lesson. A king never cries. She takes that away, and another empty hole occupies his mind - it’s starting to look like a mouth with missing teeth. It looks like things are out of place. When she’s done, and the screams have stopped trying to claw their way out of his throat, he feels different than before. He feels like something’s missing. He has a faint memory of crying, but he can’t seem to remember how to do it. He doesn’t feel anything as he watches her rip the paper crown to shreds. 

He can’t even remember why he made that in the first place.

Later, when Cal comes and apologizes, Maven forces a grin and playfully punches his brother in the arm, laughing all the way, even if inside, he feels like he’s dying, even if he’s begging Cal to save him. But of course, Cal can’t hear his brother’s pleas, or else he would’ve done something to save the drowning boy who’s run out of oxygen already. 

~

Maven notices that his father forgets about him. He’s a shadow beneath the fire prince, hidden behind his brother, Cal. He complains about it to his mother, and she tells him that this is good, shushing the six year old, promising that someday he won’t be a shadow anymore. He’ll be the fire and shadow king and no one will ever forget about him ever again.

He wants to believe his mother, but he can no longer trust her, not when she teaches him “lessons”. He no longer asks Cal for help in his head, but he almost asked one time. The words were so close to spilling out of his mouth, but he could already see his mother’s infuriated glare and her invisible hands digging inside his head, and that stopped him. 

He’s accepted that no one can help him.

~

By the time he’s ten, he an adept actor. 

He can play the part so well that he can fool himself into thinking that he’s normal. That he’s completely fine. But he’s not. The holes are more abundant than ever in his head, and he no longer knows which parts are his own and which parts are his mother’s doing. His mother has trained him well, molded him into what she wants. 

And just when he thinks that the torture is finally over, he’s proven wrong once again.

As another lesson, she teaches him that love is weak, and takes away his love for Cal and father, all the while he’s kicking and screaming, shouting at her to stop. To stop it. That she can take anything else but that, but like always, she’s deaf to his protests. 

~

Sometimes in the dead of the night, he wonders. He wonders what’s missing and what normal people are like. Maven wonders what would’ve been if he hadn’t been born a prince, if his mother hadn’t been given the power to trifle through his mind and read his thoughts and take whatever she didn’t like out. Whatever God he might’ve believed in when he was a child, he no longer believes in them. He believes that if there was a “God” than that God wouldn’t have allowed such a thing to happen to him. He blames the world. He blames his mother, father, and brother for what happened to him. 

But most of all, he blames himself for not being strong enough.

~

Every day is the same. It’s all on repeat, a continuous cycle that never seems to end. Wake up. Train. Be taught lessons. Play the part. Act some more. Pretend. Smile. Gloat. Laugh. Train. Train. Learn. Lessons. Sleep. Never dream, not anymore, she took that relief away too. He can’t remember what day it is. Is it the weekend? Monday? Tuesday? Friday? What is going on?

But, finally, something changes, and it’s the happiest Maven’s ever been. His father believes that Cal and him are old enough to fight in the war, to go onto the front lines and learn what real fighting is. Not the ones they’ve read in stories or imagined, but real life war. War full of carnage and bloodshed and screaming. He’ll finally be able to escape his mother, even if it’s only for a moment. She’s reluctant to say the least, but he doesn’t care. He’ll finally be free!

~

At thirteen, anyone sane person wouldn’t be excited to fight in a real battle, but Maven is. He’s ecstatic and even Cal says that he’s never seen his younger brother this happy, and that it’s a nice change. Cal doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Maven’s never happy. He can’t even remember the last time he’s ever actually smiled for real. 

When they arrive, he doesn’t even mind the hard work and the little food they get. He’s just relieved that he can finally breathe. And when a boy with red hair the color of his fire and the kindest eyes he’s ever seen walks in, he falls. He falls hard. He’s never felt this way before, and suddenly he can’t breathe again, but it’s a good kind of not being able to breathe. It’s like his breath has been taken away, and his head feels fuzzy, like watching an old T.V.

He later learns the boy’s name and age. His name is Thomas and he’s only a year old than Maven, but he’s a Red. He doesn’t have any powers, he’s weak and scum and disgusting and Maven doesn’t care. He doesn’t care that he’s a Silver prince with powers or that Thomas probably doesn’t know he exists. 

He’ll make him know he exists if it’s the last thing he does. 

~

Each day spent with Thomas reminds Maven that he’s not empty, that he’s not alone, that he can feel love, and he soaks up the feeling like a plant soaks up sunlight - like it’s his life source, because in a way, it is. He’s starved for affection. He’s starved to feel something other than this emptiness, and this boy can fill the hole in him up, rain filling a cup.

Thomas is funny and kind and better than anything Maven could’ve ever imagined. He is Maven’s first friend, and Maven follows him around like a lost puppy, eyes wide and filled with emotion for the first time. Thomas thinks it’s cute, and he teases the prince about it, much to Maven’s embarrassment. He still doesn’t know that Maven’s a prince, but he knows he’s a Silver, and he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care that a god is humbling himself for a mere mortal like him. 

~

It wasn’t supposed to turn out like this. 

Thomas burned instead of Maven. It wasn’t supposed to go like this. It wasn’t supposed to end like this. 

He can’t breathe anymore, he can’t even bother trying to see through the haze. He feels like the world has stopped rotating and that he’s the only one who realizes it’s stopped. It was an accident, he tells himself over and over and over again, the words becoming a song like before when his mother taught him his first lesson. 

But it isn’t going to solve anything. Thomas is dead. And it’s the fire prince’s fault. He lost control of his power, and it burned Thomas off the face of the earth. The boy who could make the prince feel something, who proved Maven could be fixed. But now...there’s nothing left but agony. The pain is worse than any pain his mother could inflict on him, and when he gets home, he _begs, pleads, screams, yells, demands, cries, needs_ her to get rid of the memory.

He needs it more than air, than food, than water. It’s overwhelming him, crashing over his head like a great tidal wave and he’s sinking again and doesn’t know how to swim back to the surface. His mother tries, she tries so many times, desperate as him, but her meddling only makes the pain worse. 

It hurts worse than any lesson she’s ever taught him and it doesn’t ever stop. 

~

There’s a change in the young boy. He grows harder and colder, turns into the weapon his mother forged and wields every single day, whispering her deceitful lies into his mind, spinning her ever growing web until it’s all he can think about. This time, he welcomes the distraction, anything that will stop the pain from swelling up like a great festering wound, to stop him from thinking about Thomas.

He refuses to even allow the name to flicker in his mind, because if it does, he’s afraid he’ll lose control of himself again. For years, he is her puppet on strings, the little marionette who crafts, lies, steals, kills, and all the while, he’s only half-there. Some other part of him is floating in space, aimlessly heading in a direction from which he cannot return from.

It no longer hurts when his mother teaches him lessons, and that’s what scares him the most - because if he can no longer feel the pain, then the one thing that kept him warm is gone. He’s cold now.

~

Maven’s seventeen, and Cal is ready to get married. It’s a nice change. He remembers that once he wanted happiness for his brother, and maybe Cal will be able to find it through his future wife. But, he knows that’s a lie. Silvers only marry for strong children, they don’t marry for love, but for power. Cal won’t survive a day with his new wife. That brings a bitter chuckle up, but he forces it down. 

He wonders when he gets married, if he’ll like it. Probably not, but he can hardly afford to care for such trifles, things below him, not when there’s a crown to focus on. 

Evangeline Samos. A magnetron, someone who can control and bend metal to their will. She’s beautiful, he admits, but nothing special. But he has to admit that her show of abilities was impressive, and she knows it, proving it with an arrogant smirk that curls her painted lips. Cal and him share glances, they already know that she’s going to be the chosen one, but he can tell that Cal is intimidated. 

Suddenly, there are screams and gasps, and he looks, surprised to see a Red standing in the middle of the electrical field, unscathed. How can this be? She’s supposed to be burned, to have some sort of wound, to be dead. But she’s standing, perfectly okay, looking as confused as everyone else is. 

He feels that familiar glow like how he felt with Thomas in his chest, but this glow is darker and oozes, damaged, but it’s love nonetheless, except a twisted kind.

It’s not his fault he’s finally feeling something again, but he hates it. Whatever normal feeling he once felt, this is no longer normal.

~

Mare Barrow. A filthy, disgusting Red rat. If her blood is as red as wine and rubies, then how can she have power flowing through her veins? How does electricity come at her beckoning? His mother says this is the perfect moment to strike, to begin their plan, and from the beginning, he’s using Mare Barrow, no matter how sorry he is.

He plays the shocked, unwilling second prince who had no idea his father was going to engage him to this girl so they can learn more about her and so no one finds out a Red has powers. She is now Mareena Titanos, a lost Silver raised by Reds, and he forces hesitation and protest into his blue eyes, making her think that he’s just as surprised as her, that he’s someone to trust.

How wrong she is. How wrong he is.

~

The next few months are a game of chess, and the whole time, his mother and him hold most of the pieces, pushing pawns in the right direction and getting rid of the rest. The whole time, he hates it, and in the depths of the night, finds himself screaming louder than he’s ever screamed inside his own mind. He can only allow himself to scream silently, because no one can find out that he’s an empty, broken boy. 

As he grows closer with Mare - or gains her trust, he finds himself developing a twisted sort of obsession for her that doesn’t seem to go away. He doesn’t like it when Cal’s gaze lingers on her or when she doesn’t pay attention to him enough. He’s tired of being forgotten about, so he does a daring thing, he joins the Scarlet Guard, pretending the whole time that he’s all for helping the Reds regain power and to end his tyrant of a father. But, all the while, it’s a ruse, and instead he’s getting important information to propel his mother’s plan forward to make him king.

When he kisses Mare for the first time, it’s like with Thomas, there’s a warm glow in his chest, except this one is darkening, turning into something twisted beyond measure. His lips are cold and his heart is stone, but all the while, hope is rekindling. Maybe this girl will be his savior, maybe like Thomas, she’ll be the one to fix him. After all, he’s been waiting for a hero for a long time. 

~

She loves Cal. 

Three words that stop his heart, stops whatever healing was happening, stops the warmth from slowly flowing back into his numb body. He’s cold again, and he can’t move. 

He is just a shadow compared to his brother. He will never be able to compete with his brother’s ability with combat, never be able to gain their father’s affections, but he knew that long before this time. He knew his father would never love him, never love the sad boy that he’s been ignoring this whole time. 

Instead of moping, like he would’ve done years ago, he uses it as fuel. The rage ignites the flame, fueling it to grow larger and larger. He doesn’t even protest when his mother tries to take his love for Mare away, he knows better to even try. Like with Thomas, she can’t seem to get rid of it, and only makes it worse, burying it deeper into his skull until it’s like a drug. 

His love for her is the only thing that keeps him warm and he wants her, even if he’ll have to kill his brother to get her. 

~

When he betrays Mare, he feels only pain, but he welcomes it. He doesn’t know when he’ll feel something again, and he eats it up, a boy starved. His mother makes his brother kill his father, and then frames Mare and him for espionage with the Scarlet Guard. The media eats it up, believes every twisted word, and they await the pair’s execution, the Red rat and Silver prince, all the while, Maven wants to do something. 

Instead, he puts on the iron and fire crown and finally smiles, a cold and cruel smile. He’s a king at last, but a king made by his mother nonetheless. 

In the Bowl of Bones, where Mare and Cal are being held, awaiting their deaths in a matter of hours, he approaches them, and Cal snarls at his brother through the bars of his cage. 

Maven can’t help but flinch, feeling like a little boy again. The anger and hurt in his brother’s eyes are painful to see, but he looks anyway. He knows he loved his brother once, but he can’t feel that love anymore, and he finds himself missing it. It’s no longer apart of him. 

But, his dark love for Mare is there, pounding his head like an anvil, and he turns to her, offering solace and a way out. She could be his Red queen while he would be her Silver king. Of course, she refuses, tells him he can rot in Hell. He dissects her words for a bit, and wonders, would Hell be warmer then earth? If so, he’d gladly go.

As he looks at her, he can’t help but grow angry. Why does his brother get everything? Why does he get to be normal and whole and not in pieces? Why didn’t he help Maven when he needed him most?! Why did he leave him behind? Why does he get Mare? Maven may have his crown, but it isn’t enough to make him happy. Mare makes him happy. Thomas made him happy. Cal once made him happy. But, they’re all gone now, aren’t they? He takes it as a sign. He isn’t meant to be fixed. Mare isn’t going to save him. If the world wants a broken king, then they’ll get that.

He stops trying to be fixed. 

~

It’s been so long. So many tiring months of fighting and ruling and being king. It’s taken a toll on him, but he doesn’t let anyone see it. He remembers all that’s gone down. Mare and Cal ended escaping their execution with the help of the Scarlet Guard. Battles and bombings happened. His mother’s death happened, caused by none other than Mare. Even if she’s gone now, a relief it is, the damage is already done. He plays the part of a wicked king, someone without mercy, someone who’s powerful and strong and deadly. 

He captured Mare, and now she’s his prisoner. He can’t seem to kill her, because if he does, he’ll be destroying the last part of himself, and then he’ll just be his mother’s creation. He needs her because she proves that he’s still human, not a monster. 

Of course she fights back, but he soon pounds it into her mind that she must obey, like he had to so many years ago. 

~

She hasn’t given up her fight, but she’s learned to bend, not break, and he admires her for that. Even he wouldn’t have been able to do that, despite all the lessons his mother taught him.

Despite her hatred for him, she’s a monster herself so when he speaks, she listens, trying to figure out the boy beneath his mother’s mask. He’s hoping that if he tells her everything his mother did, that she’ll figure out the puzzle and he’ll be able to regain himself, but hope is for idiots. Mare herself taught him that. He almost tells her that he once believed she would be his savior, but he knows it won’t change anything, so he doesn’t, even if he knows he’ll regret it like he regrets never asking Cal for help when he was a child. 

There’s no point anymore, and finally his tears come, alone in his bedroom, reflecting the hollow boy he is inside. He hasn’t cried in so long, and it isn’t a relief - it only makes him feel worse, because he knows right then and there that he’ll never be fixed, even if it’s the one thing he so desperately wants.

Why is he so stupid? No one can help him! No would want to help him, not after everything’s he done and everybody he’s hurt and killed. Maybe once, but not anymore.

The wolves are coming, and they want him dead, and he wants it to. He wants this emptiness to stop.

~

He’s too proud to end it, but it doesn’t mean that he doesn’t think about it. Maven’s pride isn’t the real reason he just doesn’t end his suffering right then and there. It’s his fear. He’s afraid that if he dies, that he’ll see his mother in whatever afterlife there is, and that she’ll keep messing with his head forever. He doesn’t want to see her again. And he most certainly doesn’t want her in his mind. Not ever again.

Mare has escaped, and is reunited with Cal. Does anything matter anymore? The Scarlet Guard is growing stronger, and his people tremble, like mice, waiting to see what the big, scary cat does. They obviously want a fight, and if they want a fight, then he’ll give them a fight to remember. This new war will go down in history, and he plans to go out in flame, burned by his own fire, like Thomas was. 

~

His allies have left him, and he’s no longer safe, but was he ever safe to begin with? He sits on his throne of Silent Stone, the one thing that can ensure him a few more seconds of life. He sinks into it, letting it overtake him, until he’s stone himself, with sapphire eyes and diamond tears. He doesn’t know what’s going on anymore, it’s like a velvet scarf has been wrapped over his eyes, blinding him. 

He knows that the end is near, and it’s all his own fault that this is happening. But, he’s his mother’s creation, and it’s not like he can change, not anymore. That window is closed for him and has been for a long time. Redemption is not a option for the shadow and fire king. 

If he was made to be a monster, then a monster they shall get, up until the very end.

~

In his final moments, he doesn’t go down without a fight, and almost kills Mare in the process, but she soon gets the upper hand and stabs him right in the chest, piercing the dark flower of his heart. He collapses to the marble ground, breathing hard and coughing up blood. He stares up at her and Cal, his vision swimming. He wants to apologize, say he loved them once, beg for salvation, ask them to save him, but he can’t force himself to say anything.

There is pity in their eyes, but also love for each other as they look at one another, and Maven hates it. He hates it so much. As he’s dying, he shouts at them, yells furious nonsense, screams at Cal for not saving him. Cal flinches, tears beginning to stream down his face, and his brother’s tears make Maven start to cry. He breaks down, coughing up blood, shaking and scared out of his mind. 

“I don’t want to die,” he begs, voice sounding pitiful, like he’s a child again, pleading with his mother to stop hurting him. “I don’t want to go. I’m scared.” 

Mare looks away, and he cries harder, reaching out for her, because she’s the only person who can make the pain better. He feels so weak, his head is pounding, and he can barely see, shadows are threatening to pounce. 

He doesn’t want to die, so he fights, he continues to fight, but he’s losing and they don’t help. Why would they? 

But, to his surprise, Cal bends down and pulls his younger brother into a hug, as Maven bleeds out. Sobs wrack his body, and Cal holds his brother harder, like Maven is made of smoke and could disappear at any moment. 

As his vision grows foggier, he closes his eyes, accepting his fate, and all grows dark. 

In his last moments, he realizes . . . he no longer feels empty. 

~

When he opens his eyes again, he’s surrounded by blinding light, and he blinks, confused. Is he dreaming? Shouldn’t he be dead?

But, before the fire king can ask questions, he feels a pull into the unknown, but it’s a safe and warm feeling, better than anything he’s ever felt. It draws him in, promising comfort and safety and he follows. 

He sheds everything, pushing everything behind him as he vanishes into the light, a small smile on his lips. 

He no longer feels like a monster.

**Author's Note:**

> i cried, anyone else, no? okay, i’ll go now.


End file.
